Lovely Blood

Sometimes we all do things that are wrong. You grab a cab that someone else hailed, you cut someone off at a red light, you take two when the sign says ‘please take only one!’ Most sins are small, harmless.

I’m not going to say that my sins were harmless, but frankly, I don’t care.

“I think this is the place.”

“Hm?”

“For the party, this is it. Most definitely.”

“This place is falling apart. This is silly,” I commented. I was at an old abandoned Catholic church about twenty minutes drive from my apartment, trying to talk my friends into a more reasonable site for our Halloween party. But Rick, the leader of our little troupe, seemed to have his heart set on the place.

“Why not poke around a bit? Can’t be that destitute, right? It’s still standing!”

“Only because no one’s had it condemned yet.” But no one was listening to me anyway. Most everyone was milling around, taking in the scenery, commenting on how high the ceiling was; a few had even started planning out the decorations. I started to wander off from the main group.

I eventually found myself in the loft above the transept. Below me, I could hear the echoes of my friends chatting and laughing. The loft was lined with beautiful stained glass windows, each one detailing some Bible story, a ‘Poor Man’s Bible’, as they used to be called. Hardly anyone in Medieval Europe could read or afford a Bible, so their main communion came from these glasses, not the holy book itself, and certainly not the services conducted in a dead language.

I had to hand it to Rick though, this place certainly was creepy enough. From below, my friend’s voices formed haunting echoes as the high, stone walls refracted sound into a low rumbling. Shadows danced in front of the glasses, dulling the reds of spilled martyr blood. The darkness gave form to my imaginings, and the echoes gave rise to moans, echoes, and crying.

“Mack! Where are you, buddy?!” came the voice of Sarah. I hadn’t noticed her clomping up the loft stairs.

“Oh. Hi Sarah.”

“We’re taking off. Rick’s already decided. It’s a shame, you know, I really wanted him to check out some more places, but it seems like he’s really got his heart set,” she sounded disappointed.

“You don’t like this place?”

“It’s creepy.” She muttered, shivering, “and cold.”

“Well, I dunno about the cold, but isn’t it supposed to be creepy?”

“Well yeah, I guess… but-“

“Wait!” I had heard it again, distinctly this time, the sound of crying, “Do you hear that?”

“Hear what?” She looked puzzled.

“Just, be quiet for a sec…”

We both paused. I could hear it growing louder. It was definitely the sound of someone crying, probably a girl.

“Well?” I asked.

“Uhhh…” Sarah was thoroughly confused, it seemed.

“Can’t you hear that? It sounds like someone’s crying!”

Sarah stared at me as if I was crazy, before smirking wryly.

“Nice try, Mack, but I’m not that gullible. This place may be creepy, but you’re not gonna scare me.”

“No, wait, hold on, I’m serious-!”

“Come on Mack, we’re leaving.” She grabbed my wrist and dragged me out of the loft. I heard the crying in my head all the way home.

Rick decided on another place anyway; I guess Sarah took him around to some mausoleum or graveyard and he fell in love all over again. At least, that’s what Hu, another one of my friends, said as he led into asking me for a favor, “Anyway, yeah. Left my camera at that cathedral. You’re the closest one, so how about swinging by and picking it up for me?”

“Why’d you bring a camera?”

“Take pictures. Rick wanted ‘reference materials.’ “

“…Great. Where’d you leave it?”

“In one of the pews in the nave, towards the back, by the priest-thingy.”

“You mean the altar?”

“Yeah. That. Anyway. Pick it up? Please? It’s not too expensive, but I’d rather not have to buy another one.”

“…Fine. I’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Thanks, bro.”

Click, goodbye.

The cathedral was dark. I had neglected to ask where the circuit box was, so I was stuck with a flashlight in a dark, creepy cathedral. At night. I’d have gone during the day, but I worked pretty much from dawn ‘til dusk and didn’t want to have Hu calling me a pussy for waiting until the weekend.

As I walked down the nave my steps echoed off the high stone arches like mini-cannonfire. I looked up and down each pew, no sign of the damn camera, and the shivers down my spine weren’t exactly helping. And then the crying, again. Low and soft.

“Is… is there someone there?” I felt like an idiot. If this was a horror movie I would’ve just signed my death warrant. The crying broke off suddenly and then started again. Louder.

The camera was in the last pew by in front of the altar, but the crying was coming from above me. As I walked up the creaking stairs to the loft, the sound only grew louder. I stood in the loft, and the moonlight poured the glass-stained color all around me. The sound was still coming from above. I trained the flashlight on the ceiling. A cord to an attic door hung down, but it looked too high for me to reach.

After a few pathetic jumping movements, I managed to snag the cord and pull down, hard. The attic stairs crashed down with a large puff of dust. I coughed and hacked like a diseased cat. The crying continued unabated.

I knew then that this was a terrible idea. But I continued on, nonetheless. I continued up the stairs, throwing up little storms of dust with every step. And there, in the attic of the old church, surrounded by dust and old furniture draped in white sheets, was Risa Yagami.

Risa Yagami slit her wrists back in high school. Opened her veins, and let the blood drain down into a sink before blacking out and collapsing on the cold linoleum while her parents were out for dinner.

She was my friend.

But she was crazy.

She heard things. Voices, mostly. She needed help. I don’t know if anyone else knew, but I did. I never told anyone. And for that she died.

“Risa?” She was still wearing the white dress they had buried her in, her hands turned down artfully in the coffin to hide the wounds.

She stopped crying and looked up. Her eyes widened in surprise.

“M-Mack?” The mortician’s mascara ran down her face.

“W-what!? H-how!?” I was on the verge of starting to scream.

“MACK!” She screamed, getting up and stumble-running towards me. I almost expected her to rip me apart, but instead, she just threw her arms around me.

“Mackmackmackmackmackmackmack…”

“No- I mean… how!? Y-your dead! I-I saw you in your coffin!” But she wasn’t listening. She just kept crying my name. I kneeled down on the dusty floor and tried to comfort her.

“Hey… come on… stop crying… it’s okay now… I think…” It’s hard to be convincing when you’re trying to cheer up a dead girl.

“N-no… I mean… it’s just… I’m happy… I-I never thought I’d see you again.” She felt cold and pale, but she was obviously sweating. I put my hand to her forehead, and was nearly scorched.

“Look… there’s time for that later. You-you’re very sick. We have to get you to a hospital…”

“H-hospital?”

“Yeah, come on, we gotta go…” I took hold of her wrist and tried to lead her to the staircase.

“N-no!” she shrieked, recoiling from the threshold.

“What’s the matter?” Quite a lot, obviously, but I couldn’t think to be more specific.

“The- I- I can’t leave…”

“W-what!? Come one, you’ve got to, I mean, I don’t know how you got up here, but you have to leave. You need help.”

“N-no! They-they won’t let me… can’tleave.. gotta wait… gottawait, you-you’ll come.. I’ll wait for you… it’s fine, it’s fine… cuz now you’re here, but I can’t leave… I can never leave…” she was whispering to herself now.

“Alright, alright… you can stay… I-I just gotta go get some help… I gotta-“

“N-no! Please! Don’t go! Don’tgodon’tgodon’tgopleasedon’tgo…” She clutched at me desperately, crying harder than ever.

“Alright, alright, sshhh.. don’t cry, it’s okay, really, I’ll stay…” I tried to calm her down, stroking her hair gently.

“R-really?”

“Y-yeah. I can stay for a while… just… just try to calm down, okay?”

“R-right. I’m sorry.” She had stopped crying, and just kneeled on the floor, looking across to me, also sitting. Suddenly I felt rather awkward. I got up and started to move about the room, trying to keep from looking at the dead girl.

“W-why are you here?” I asked, more to cover my own nervousness than anything else.

“I… I don’t really know…” she replied sadly. The room was sparsely decorated. It looked like it might’ve once been a priest’s private room, a shelf with musty, rotting books, a bed draped in archaic linen, and a single wooden chair by the large, central window which streamed moonlight in on us.

“Well… what’s the last thing you remember?”

She was silent. She got up and walked over to the bed before lying down on it and wrapping herself in the sheets.

“I can’t remember.”

“What are you doing?”

She looked up at me puzzled. “It’s cold.”

“Oh.” Now that she mentioned it, it was rather chilly. I could feel the goose-bumps on my arms, though those probably had more to do with the dead girl than the temperature.

“Mack…” she whispered.

“Yeah, Risa?” I replied, trying to hide my fear by staring intently at a leather-bound whose spine had long since dissolved into dust.

“Come here. Please…”

I turned to face her. She had bundled herself in the sheets, but the moonlight still caught her hair, making tiny streams of light run down the highlights. I walked over slowly as she patted the bed beside her.

What was it that drove me, then? Was it guilt? Lust? Grief? Or maybe I just saw my best friend come back to life, and wanted to be with her. Maybe you think she possessed me. Used her wiles and deathly magicks to bewitch me. But her smile had my heart, her eyes my soul since the day I met her in a sandbox at the age of five.

I felt the camera in my pocket, digging into my side as I lay down next to her. I took it out, and, on a whim, turned it on. It whizzed mechanically to life.

“What’s that for?” She asked simply.

“I dunno. Commemorate the reunion, I guess.”

I held it to position it in front of us and clicked down the shutter.

“You’re warm…” she whispered. She was cold. Cold as the grave. But as I held her, I felt her begin to grow warmer.

I awoke shortly before dawn. She was still asleep, breathing softly next to me. The sun was only starting to come over the horizon, shining squares of light onto the bed where we lay. I was curious as to what photos Hu had taken of the church and why they were so important. I grabbed the camera and began flipping through the tiny LCD slides of his photos. Mostly it was just the stained glass and the arches. At least Hu had an eye for architecture. I came to the last photo of myself and Risa, but it wasn’t a picture of me and her. It was a picture of me on an empty bed, pointing a camera at myself like I was an idiot. If I had looked at it later, I might’ve counted it as evidence that the whole night had been a delusion, but it was obvious that my mind had played no tricks; the naked girl next to me was proof enough of that.

I got up, put on my clothes and paced a bit. Finally, I sat down and wrote Risa a note saying that I’d be back the next evening and with no small amount of hesitation, left.

A lot of information can be found on the Internet, but I would say more could be found at an old library when you know someone who works there. As it turns out, my friend Hu was a librarian himself, and he was more than happy to let me browse through the old archives of ghost and supernatural literature at the public library where he worked. I searched for days, but eventually found my answers in a book on Japanese apparitions written by an Englishman towards the end of the 19th Century.

Chapter 29: The Sakura-Koi Jinki-Yurei: A Ghost of Passion

In the legends of olde Nippon, there are few more remarkable than those of the Sakura-Koi. While some would debate that their classification belongs under daemonica rather than the ghostly, several things are undisputed about this particular type of Japanese apparition.

It is common in Japanese legacy that most ghosts arise from the souls of dead women, scorned by their lovers. It is believed that the most powerful ties in the universe are those of love, and therefore the most likely to bind souls to the mortal plane, most often for vengeance.

However, the Sakura-Koi is no vengeful harpy. Rather, she is a testament to the endurance of love. She enters most prominently in tales of lost love, as in when women are slaughtered before their true love can be realized or consummated. Cut down before her true love’s meeting, she is raised by a benevolent kami to be re-united with her lover for all eternity.

However, this spirit is not just some gentle recompense to complete the happy end of a Japanese bushido saga. When first summoned back to the mortal realm, she is bound to places of holiness, most often shrines and other religious parishes, and is unable to cross the threshold of the place. After which, she must mourn for her lost lover until he comes to reclaim her. Then, the dark secret of her gentle soul is revealed.

As mentioned, it is debated whether the Sakura-Koi is ghost or daemon, for it is said that she is not truly a resurrected copse, but rather, the embodiment of the love borne towards her possessing her erstwhile deceased corpse, in much the same way that other Japanese ghosts are daemons of hatred, lust, and shame. In much the same way that the kami will not let the spirit of a woman scorned rest, they will not let the body of a woman who took her own life despite her lover’s attentions find peace in the grave.

Sakura-Koi arise from women that bled out their lives. Robbed of the sanguine that sustains all life, she must be recompensed with the blood of the wicked at the approximate rate of a pint a week in order to sustain her eternal youth and form. Without it, she fades slowly into nothingness. Furthermore, this blood must be gathered and delivered to her by her true love, or else it is useless.

Helpless to fate, beholden to her lover and his willingness to damn himself with the blood of other men, the Sakura-Koi are perhaps the truest example of the heroine archetype, and an interesting study into the folklore of…”

Here, I set down the book and re-shelved it. To keep Risa alive, I would have to kill people. It would not be enough to bring her food like some house pet, or the blood of animals, or even to just to rob a blood bank. I would have to track down ‘wicked’ men, murder them, drain them of their blood, and give it to her.

Maybe people will think that I should have closed the book, walked away, and never gone back to that old church. But how could I stay away, knowing that my love for Risa had literally brought her back from the dead? How could I bear watching her slowly weaken every night, struggling to smile as I held her, despite running a high fever that could burn to the touch? How could I live with the knowledge that her cure was within my grasp?

I may be damned for my love, but at least we will be damned together.

In 1994, the Jacob Wetterling Act, passed by the Congress of the United States, required all states to pass legislation that would require all convicted sex offenders to register with state sex offender registries. In 2007, the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act made the addresses of every convicted sex offender available over the internet. You can go online, browse to a webpage, and download a map of pure evil in your local area. It may protect children, sure, but to me, it was more like a Zagat’s Guide.

I was methodical in the pursuit of my lover’s cure. I would follow and research. I planned meticulously. I waited until they were alone, I picked locks and gassed them with chloroform before they even knew I was there. I wore gloves and covered my hair. I left no blood, no fingerprints, no evidence.

I bought an apartment in a rough part of town and put eight locks on the door. I made sure the bathroom drain worked and then put down the first and last month’s rent.

I opened their jugular and poured the medicine through funnels, down into large plastic gallon jugs, all six quarts of it.

I laid them to their final rest in a bathtub containing a home-brew of quicklime, bleach, gasoline, and acetic acid. It melts down to rapist soup and doesn’t leave much of a smell. They all went down the drain that way.

Don’t try to moralize or justify to me, because I simply didn’t care. They were all just medicine to me.

“I brought you something tonight, Risa,” I began. She was helping me take off my coat.

“Mmm?” She murmured.

“Medicine.” She carefully folded the jacket before draping it over our meager wooden chair.

“I… I’m feeling… better, I think. You shouldn’t worry so much…” she spoke slowly, but I could tell she was only trying to hide the pain. She started unbuttoning my shirt.

“Still, I want you to try it.” She took off the shirt, folded it like the jacket, and placed it carefully over the coat.

“Where is it?” she asked as she lay down on the bed.

“Here.” I held up the small pint-sized cough syrup bottle I had recovered from my bag. I sat down on the bed and took off my shoes.

She took it from me and studied the label. “Cough medicine?”

“Sort of,” I replied, swinging my feet up on to the mattress, “Here.”

I motioned and she snuggled up to me, resting her head against my chest and handing me back the bottle. I took off the small dosing cap and carefully poured out a dram of blood.

“Trust me,” I said softly, holding it to her lips. My heart raced, and my hands shook so bad that I spilled a bit of it on my fingers.

She glanced at me for a moment, and then traced her hands next to mine, holding the cup, “Of course I trust you.” She opened her mouth and drank back the deep red sanguine.

She was quiet for a moment. “Does… does it taste bad?”

“N-no…” she stuttered , breathing heavily, “It’s delicious.”

“Really?”

“Y-yes...” Her cheeks flushed for the first time since her resurrection, “C-can I have some more?”

“O-of course. Drink it all. It’ll make you feel better.” She took the bottle from me reverently before holding it once again to her lips and draining it. She licked her lips, savoring the flavor.

“Mmmm…” she purred softly. She noticed the blood on my fingers and gently held them to her mouth before licking them clean.

“Delicious,” she murmured, turning over on her side so her face was to mine.

I awoke the next morning to find her asleep again, as usual. I supposed she was nocturnal. Maybe you judge me for the deception, for the murder. I didn’t want to scare her. I didn’t want to burden her. Still, somehow she probably knew, but it seemed better not to come out and say it. And then, how could I stop now? As I traced the ridges and curves of her sleeping body with my fingers, I knew I could never stop.

I brought her a pint every week from then on, as the book had recommended. Gradually, her health improved. Her skin warmed, her fever cooled. The blush returned to her cheeks, the strength to her lethargic muscles. Her thin frame filled, her lips abandoned a cold blue for a lovely rose-red, and her eyes shone with light once again.

The room changed as well, in little ways so that I almost didn’t notice. There was less and less dust until it vanished entirely. The books grew back their leather; the rotted pages shed their mold. The broken wooden chair turned to mahogany and cushioned itself with down and leather. The bed’s frame turned to maple and widened. The mattress seemed to gather springs and stuffing. The sheets turned to silk, and the threadbare blanket grew into a warm woolen comforter. The window wiped itself of grime and bedecked itself in crimson curtains. The walls fashioned a deep red paint from their peeling wallpaper, grew out candelabras whose candles never went out, and the floor’s creaking boards turned to solid oak paneling.

And me? I grew as well. Every time I lay with her, I felt strength pouring into me. She would kiss my skin and murmur in Japanese; from where she kissed I could feel strength radiate inward. The few tyrannies of age I had accumulated ceased. My hair did not grow or become tangled, but merely arranged itself neatly. My stubble receded without use of razor. I no longer grew tired, or fatigued. I could lift things without breaking a sweat that would make a fit man wince in pain. And eventually, my talents for murder refined.

I no longer needed to hide in darkness, I simply willed myself unseen and I was invisible. I left not traces, and could vaporize the flesh of my victims with a snap of my fingers once I had drained out what I had needed.

Who am I? What am I? I’m really not sure anymore. I know that I am loved, and that I love. I may very well be damned, but damnation, monstrosity, inhumanity, an eternity of flame or any other torture, is worth it to be with her now. I am an eternal darkness and love made manifest.

So to you who prey upon on the weak or innocent, you are numbered by my will. Your screams will not sate me. Your pain will never be enough. The tortures I inflict, the fury that I bring will know no end. I am dwelling in an eternity that is beyond all comprehension. Your flesh will not satisfy me, nor will your begging and pleading. All that I require of you, all I will accept from you is what my mistress needs. All I want from you is your lovely, lovely blood.

-fin-

Author’s Notes:

Catholic Church Terminology

Altar – the section of a Catholic church where the priest conducts the service, often directly opposite the main entrance.

Nave – the central walkway of a Catholic church, lined with pews leading up to the altar.

Transept – A bisecting aisle of a Catholic church, positioned as such that the floor plan of the church looks like a cross. It often contains small chapels, a “Poor Man’s Bible,” and a loft.

Japanese Translation

Sakura – ‘cherry tree’ in Japanese, often associated with the red color of cherry blossoms and blood.

Koi – Japanese for ‘love.’

Jinki – Flesh-eating Japanese ghosts.

Yurei – Japanese ghosts. Often depicted as being clothed in white dresses, signifying the white burial kimonos used in Edo period death rites. In the Japanese faith, Shinto, white is a color of ritual purity, reserved for priests and the dead.

Other Notes

There are approximately six quarts of blood in the average human body.